Talking Run Roo Run with 5th Cell's Jeremiah Slaczka

If you're a gamer on the go or just someone that enjoys the pick-up-and-play nature of many iOS titles, chances are you've recently come across 5th Cell's Run Roo Run in the App Store. The game, which was announced an then quickly released just last week, marks the company's first new IP since Scribblenauts in 2009 and puts micro-platformers in the role of Roo, a mother kangaroo, chasing her captured Joey across the outback.

The game is rather simplistic in its design of course (and rather fun I might add), but having known the team at 5th Cell for a little while now, I was sure that there was more to the story of Run Roo Run than most people would assume. Well, I recently had the chance to discuss the project with 5th Cell's Creative Director and CEO Jeremiah (Miah) Slaczka to get some insight into the origin of the game, the idea of making titles for "everyone" as a studio, and exactly why mobile games need time, thought, and a lot of love to create a successful experience that people will enjoy playing.

Q: It's always good to catch up with you, Miah! I hope you're 2012 is off to a, uh, "running" start. Now, about Run Roo Run, how did the design concept for the game first come about? Was this an idea you've had for a while or did a flash of inspiration result in turning this around from concept to completion rather quickly?

JS: I was inspired by a flash game called Space is Key, by Chris Jeff. I loved the simple concept of it. It kept gnawing at me for months until one Saturday I decided to write a quick design spec. I showed it to our tech director and we began prototyping it.

The end result, however, was the product of months of iteration. I love iteration – its how I work best and how I believe you make the best games. No one can draw up a design and solve all the problems before the project is completed; games are too complex for that. If you have a great basic idea, and just keep moving in that direction, you’ll find your way to a successful product, eventually.

Q: Kind of a similar question, but to be specific, what was the development time on the title and how many folks were involved in Run Roo Run's creation?

JS: In total, development took about five months with four people working mostly full-time on it.

Q: Obviously, the game has a very friendly and distinct identity through its art style and character design. Is what we're seeing as the end result pretty much what you envisioned from the get go or did it endure numerous iterations before reaching the final result?

JS: It’s more or less the end result. I threw together some clip art for our artist as an idea of what I was looking for, then we just iterated on that. I knew the main character had to look iconic, so we spent about a week nailing the mother kangaroo down. I'm really happy with what we ended up with. She's very cute.

Q: I gotta say, the music and overall audio atmosphere is equally as enjoyable as the art style. Can you give us some insight into the game's audio design?

JS: When we were working on the music style, our greatest concern was “ear fatigue.” The biggest problem we would face is people playing for too long and getting sick of the audio, so we made sure the music faded in and out and that all the sound effects were soft and simple. We really tried to base our audio off that general concept.

Q: In today's day and age, especially on iOS and similar platforms, people always talk about accessibility as being key to success. Well, you can't get more accessible than the one-touch controls of Run Roo Run. Was that an initiative from day one with this project or did you just find that one-touch controls worked best for the experience you were trying to create?

JS: The iOS controls best when it’s simple and easy to pick up and play. That’s what Run Roo Run was always aimed at being. The one-touch mechanism is great because it leaves no room for interpretation or user-error, making it totally accessible to everyone. One of the most frustrating things about games is when controls don't work intuitively or the way you think they should, so we thought this was a great way to go.

Q: Like all good platformers, the game does a great job of gradually getting you used to its various mechanics, from double jumps to switches and everything in-between. How did you go about coming up with the ideas for these? Did you design the different mechanics first and then develop the levels around them or vice-versa?

JS: The original game was just an endless runner with no new content or mechanics, but we quickly changed that.

We’ve made platformers before, and played a ton of them. Our level designer, Adam Fenderson, technical director, Marius Fahlbusch, and myself did some brainstorming and whipped up a list of mechanics we thought would work well. We spent months perfecting them to make sure they felt intuitive. That was the hardest part, for sure.

Q: How did you go about play testing this game? Were there specific people or a target audience that you wanted the game to resonate with the most? From my wife to both of my sons (ages 6 and 8) and myself, we all played it and really enjoyed it! Not too many games (aside from maybe Angry Birds) can accomplish that, can they?

JS: We’ve been making a lot of games that target “everyone” for years now, Scribblenauts especially.

I know that "everyone" is the broadest, most difficult market to target, but we really just enjoy making products that both you, your children, gamer and non-gamer friends alike can enjoy together. That's the real motivation.

The mobile market is a perfect meld of all types of people, since everyone needs a phone! It's the perfect platform for the types of games we love to share.

Q: Progressing through the game is pretty straight forward, but is keenly designed to avoid frustration by letting you succeed at your own pace and providing the challenge of improving upon your own personal achievements. How do you think this enhances the games replay value and make the game accessible to non-traditional gamers?

JS: Since the iOS market is so diverse, it was important to balance the difficulty level so that it would appeal to hardcore and casual, young and old. We erred on the side of an enjoyable, simple experience to progress through the game. But we also created the star system and extreme levels for those who wanted the extra challenge.

Non-traditional gamers will be able to complete the game however they want, in whatever amount of time they want, with whatever in-app help they need. On the other hand, if you feel like you need to get the fastest speed on GameCenter for every level, including the extreme levels, then you have that option, too. Everyone can play the game however they want; that was the goal and that's why it's fun for everyone.

Q: I was sent this question for you via Twitter. It comes from jgblankenship – "Feels like there's a really big jump between regular levels and Extreme challenges, with not much in-between. Why that design?"

JS: We have to remember that a large segment of the iOS gamer market is made up of people who have really never played many video games until they owned an iOS device, so testing Run Roo Run on traditional gamers wasn't necessarily an accurate representation of our players.

What we discovered was that many iOS gamers just didn’t have the twitch reaction skills needed for games like Run Roo Run at extreme level or speed (how it was originally designed). It was simply too hard.

With that in mind, we decided to make it a more relaxing experience in general. We know that gamers still want to have a challenge, though, so we tried to bring that to them with the extreme levels.

Q: The game just recently launched, but I know there's plans for weekly content updates to keep the game fresh in people's minds and active on their play lists. Can you give us some more insight into how that all will work?

JS: Currently, if you beat all of the game’s normal levels you can download 10 new levels, for free, once every week, without having to update the app in the app store. We'll be supporting this as long as people are still playing the game (indefinitely).

Q: I gotta ask, how did you land on the name "Run Roo Run"? Were there alternate options? "Jump Joey Jump"? "Hop Harry Hop"? "Leap Lucky Leap?"

JS: Funny you should ask; it was originally called Ozzy’s Outback for the pitch document I wrote up. But then Joe, one of 5TH Cell's other co-founders, came up with name Run Roo Run. It suited the game so well, how could we say no?

Q: The title is priced at .99¢ on iPhone/iPod Touch and $1.99 on iPad, which makes for a rather good deal when considering the fun-factor and replay value of the game. Do you see 5th Cell turning out more low-cost projects with small development windows and quick turnarounds or is this more of an experiment to see how a project like this performs in the rather crowded mobile market?

JS: It’s a bit premature to say how much we’ll dive into mobile projects in the future. Scribblenauts Remix has done very well for iOS, so mobile is definitely on our radar.

I do like the smaller development cycles and teams, but you wouldn't believe how much time and effort goes into making these games good. Of course it's possible for us to churn out a mobile game with 4 people and a few weeks of work – but no one would want to play it. It needs time, thought, and a lot of love to make it a game people will actually enjoy playing.

Q: We've spoken about this before, but one thing I'm always impressed with about 5th Cell is that you seem to genuinely want to create good games first and simply consider all options when deciding where and when they should be released. The company's content portfolio is rather diverse and ranges across a multitude of platforms, so how would you define 5th Cell's design philosophy in today's ever-changing environment of interactive entertainment?

JS: That’s simple: we make the stuff we like. Everyone here at 5TH Cell is here because they want to work on something different, something new. There’s nothing wrong with doing sequels, we’ve done some ourselves. But what sets us apart is that we just work on what we feel like and that’s not limited by any platform or genre.

Q: Lastly, I know I'll hear it if I don't at least ask you about Hybrid. You and the team spent some time gathering up feedback and applying it to the finished product, correct? When can we expect to hear more about the game?

JS: I’m dying to show off Hybrid; it’s changed a lot. It’s a vastly superior game to what we showed at last year’s GDC. If all goes well, we’ll be able to reveal the new Hybrid very, very soon.

Q: Alright Miah, thanks as always for your time! I'm looking forward to seeing how people react to Run Roo Run! Best of luck with this exciting new IP!

JS: Thanks so much for having me Daniel! It’s always a pleasure.

If you're interested in checking out Run Roo Run for yourself, you can see the game in action right here on GT and find out even more about it over on the game's official website.